Sony’s ‘Hotel Transylvania’ Checks in at No. 1

It was a frightfully great weekend for Sony Animation’s Hotel Transylvania, which checked in at the number-one spot at the box office, with an estimated $43 million total in 3,349 theaters stateside. Directed by acclaimed TV veteran Genndy Tartakovsky (Dexter’s Laboratory, Samurai Jack) this crowd-pleasing take on popular movie monsters such as Dracula, Frankenstein and the Wolfman has also broken the all-time September theatrical openings and is the studio’s highest grossing animated movie to date. The pic should continue to deliver solid numbers through the Halloween season.

Sony’s sci-fi live-action thriller Looper also had a great weekend at the No. 2 spot, making an estimated $20 million this weekend. The well-reviewed feature (93% on rottentomatoes.com) stars Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis and Emily Blunt.